Overlanders

If you buy a motorcycle in Latin American using your ride to deliver food is one way to help pay for it. The delivery system is well established and we’ve been in Arequipa long enough we’ve learned to enjoy getting Indian lamb curry delivered on two wheels. 

And don’t be surprised to see women riding either. 

Along with Chinese cars and phones you will see other products outlawed by the US sold on store shelves. I can’t say Havana Club rum tastes particularly good ($18) and we stuck with Flor de Caña from Nicaragua which we find smoother. But around here you can at least make your own mind up. 

If you like Kellogg products you’ll find them in supermarkets all the way down (not Post) but I also spotted chocolate flavored nonsense produced locally that the llama ( pronounced “yah-mah”) promises has reduced sugar content with cinnamon and stevia. Very modern. If you think it’s all tortillas and rice and beans like the 1950s you’d be amazed. 

So I’ve heard a desire for more traveler stories so here’s a round up. And don’t be surprised that they all speak German. Above is Paul and Andrea in a four wheel drive Sprinter conversion. They are going south so don’t be surprised to see them again. Paul admits to getting stressed on the road and he hates dirt roads especially as his big rig sways a lot on uneven surfaces. Andrea wants to go to Bolivia to see pink flamingos and salt flats but Paul really didn’t want to go, as he knows Bolivia will be a hassle. I hope we’ll see them in Patagonia and find out how it was.

Jurg and Anya are below. Always smiling Jurg is on his second tour of South America in a Ford pick up truck. They are going to tour Peru but  with a shipping date in December back to Germany they are running out of time. His best friend owns a company that builds Unimog four wheel drive expedition trucks and he has begged Jurg to come back for a few more years to help. Jurg really likes the work so he’s off home again. That’s another couple we would love to see if or when we take GANNET2 to Europe (after Rusty). 

Herman the manager going to open the big gate for Jurg and Anya to leave. You can imagine Layne has everyone’s WhatsApp and is communicating with them. 

A rental camper truck from Chile turned up in the night apparently occupied by…Germans of course. You can rent and tour for a few weeks or months and save yourself the hassle of getting here. 

There you go, check their website if you are so inclined: 

Cora and Florian last seen in northern Peru at the beach. First seen at Sommerwind campground in northern Ecuador. Florian is a cog train engineer and helped Sean repair the diesel fuel pump in his Volkswagen Eurovan. Cora is an operating theater nurse and is taking a keen interest in Layne and her leg wound. She inspects it and doesn’t throw up…

Sean and Nina on their way to Alaska in a Volkswagen camper van with lots of mechanical issues. His gearbox is popping out of gear and his glow plugs are worn out, problems he hopes to solve in Lima. 

Nina had her 35th birthday and we drank Pisco and ate cake at the potluck with the American family hunkered grumpily in their Sprinter van. Sean is a social worker and Nina is a physical therapist and they have no deadline to reach Alaska with their adopted Chilean kitten rescued from a log pile on a farm. You can see Layne getting their WhatsApp.

Their drone followed them out much to my amazement. 

The Americans have left too, apparently going south unfortunately. I feel sorry for their kids who sit around silently, hooded, with none of the joy of childhood I have come to expect from travelers’ offspring. After their stupid fight with Sean over the ridiculous cat situation they actually did as he had asked politely in the first place and everyone exercised their animals on a separate schedule. They missed out on meeting some really nice people. 

I somehow got on a history-mail list and I have come to enjoy the daily odd facts. I’ve reproduced here a column about some illustrious van lifers from the past just to prove there’s nothing new under the sun: 

I wonder how long the powers will allow us to wander at will on public lands in the US camping in glorious wilderness. We get to see so many wonders at home that the places Europeans crave to visit in South America are a reminder of how few natural wonders there are in their overpopulated corner of the planet. I’ve seen pink flamingoes and alligators in south Florida, salt flats in Utah and canyons and mountains all over the western US. Europeans aren’t so lucky. 

Above you see an innovation we embraced years ago sailing through Central America- solid dish soap. It doesn’t spill and it works. Highly recommended next time you are in Mexico eating tacos pick up some tubs of dish detergent. You’ll thank me. 

In the era of instant communication above you see someone totally left behind. And below internet banking has yet to arrive for most working people. I snuck a picture at Banco de la Nacion of people lining up in crowds to speak to a teller. I was in line thirty minutes to deposit 25 bucks into the government account for Rusty, the little darling, to leave the country.  

And if the road through Big Sur in California remains closed due to landslides don’t forget there’s three hundred miles of empty coast road here in Peru for you to enjoy. 

Come on down and mix it up with a bunch of Germans. It’s what we do. 

Hurricane Helene

Laynes next appointment to get her leg wound irrigated and checked is Monday so until then we are waiting and as we wait in Arequipa a vast category four hurricane is devastating…Appalachia? What weirdness is this? In Arequipa an overflowing faucet of some sort is wasting desert water and no one notices and I am pondering the misery of hurricane recovery. 

The story out of Tampa Bay and Big Bend seem normal enough, debris, misery and uncertainty but the deaths by flooding reported in the. Carolina’s and Georgia and even Tennessee are extraordinary. We celebrated a German overlander’s birthday with cake and Jäegermeister (yuck) and Layne called her sister outside Asheville. They have cell service thanks to a neighbor with Starlink but they are trapped in their community as the main bridge over the river is washed away. Just like that. 

Seven Mile Ridge Road over the Little Toe River is gone.

Just one of so many disasters around Asheville that has cut communications and left people isolated. Key West meanwhile has forgotten the high drama of fifty mile an hour winds from their modest sideswipe. We went out to lunch and had crepes at a French restaurant, what a bizarre contrast to our many hurricane survival memories. 

Traffic is the big hassle in Arequipa and with Layne not supposed to walk taking cans and Ubers everywhere gets old. 

There are only four vans left in the campground and one van is leaving for Cusco today.  The weird California family doesn’t talk to the rest of us but crouch over their laptops ignoring us which is probably best. To get a comment from a reader who has met them boggled my mind. The campground does not reverberate to the sounds of joyous youth at play. 

Day follows day as we wait for our departure date hopefully Friday. 

Peru The Struggle

I had to start the process of getting Rusty his exit papers for child by going to the national agriculture office (SENASA) near the airport. I know most people don’t show what South America really looks like restraining their pictures to manicured shots of monuments sunsets and wildlife but… this is me for good or ill. 

The road to the airport is undergoing construction, dusty change is in the air but the people just keep doing what they do as traffic threads its way noisily through diversions. 

This is where locals shop and where other locals try to make some money or extra money in a second informal job. Next time you feel oppressed think about these guys spending the day making pennies.

I’ve seen small kids, barely more than toddlers selling candies to passing cars. Mothers have their kids along as they sell fruit or cookies on the sidewalk. It depresses me and I don’t mean to sound preachy but traveling here helps to keep me grateful even on the days when the road feels like crap. 

I am fascinated by the words used in Peru that I haven’t seen in other countries. Around here they call gas stations as “grifos” and the shame of it is I can’t find out why.  Maybe it’s a brand made that has become universal like Kleenex but if you want to ask if there’s a gas station ahead grifo is the word to use. 

And then you drive past a banal gas station -a grifo- and there’s a snow covered volcano in the background.

Peru has so much to offer the world, cuisine, countryside,  and history. And I think if their leaders got this country in gear the people would blossom. As it is daily life is a struggle and Peru reminds me that the story in the US is always that you can have hope. Failure can lead to success sometimes and everyone can hope. In Peru you are what you are and it ain’t much for most people. It’s so stark here I can’t escape the struggle. 

When I come across a Peruvian who will open up, who is content I am reminded of what could be and I have enjoyed some conversations especially with people whose businesses we have frequented more than once. The national minimum wage that is the normal rate of pay for the lower classes is 35 soles a day: US $9:50 Money can’t buy happiness they say but it can buy peace of mind. Thank god for our pensions. 

The funny thing is everyone has a phone and they use them to isolate themselves on their phones. We think of phones as our expensive electronics aboard GANNET2 where we watch television on iPads and use our phones for navigation and communication. Peruvians live on their phones. 

We had to make copies of our new documents, driver license and registration and our pet papers and border forms and these guys took care of us for 42 soles ($11). Not cheerful, not chatty but efficient and capable.  Most travelers make laminated copies of their drivers license to avoid presenting their original at checkpoints. We would never do such a thing you understand but if we did this would be the kind of place where we could get color laminated copies of our licenses. 

We spent 68 soles on lunch which is Layne’s only trip daily outside the campground. She props her leg up and we shared a plate of fish. 

Rusty and I go walking and Layne rests her leg. That’s our day. 

And just like that without counting the Uber rides we spent three times the minimum wage. How they do it with children, even with family support can’t be easy. My opening page on my phone is a picture of GANNET2 in Alamos in northern Mexico. I can go there anytime.  

There is an irony in all this as we can’t get to see Cusco and the famous part of Peru and most bitterly for me I don’t get to see Lake Titicaca that I have been wanting to see for sixty years since I read about Thor Heyerdahl. That part will just have to wait a few months until we drive north for home next year. It’ll be there meanwhile I’ve seen the parts no one talks about.